


Phantasm

by Elyssian



Series: [K]ollection [5]
Category: Big Bang (Band)
Genre: Also on asianfanfics, Multi, but hopefully this will be long, supernatrual AU, this is gonna be slow
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-25
Updated: 2016-08-18
Packaged: 2018-05-23 04:20:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 6,567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6104721
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elyssian/pseuds/Elyssian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Seunghyun plays with the people's money, Youngbae gets them tipsy, Daesung eases people into the club with his smile and Seungri will entertain the lonely souls. When the right person comes, one of them will point out the discreet booth hanging over the floor and Jiyong will do what he does best.<br/>Or,<br/>If you're not human, chances are at some point in your life you're going to be passing through their bar. Here's a tip; if the man with the stars in his eyes and the fire under his skin asks for your name, never give him your real name. Dragons have odd powers that way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Ominous [PILOT]

**Author's Note:**

> Shoutout to asianfanfics.com's Chocolite, who sits in front of me in school. To Chocolite; I dearly regret and dearly don't regret the day I asked you to recommend me some Kpop songs.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> [PILOT] Please read this chapter with the understanding that it is a draft, and may not link to further chapters.

As Sandara leads Minzy into the club, the air weighted by psychedelic airs and humming with energy, she giggles into her ear. “You're gonna love them. They're weird!”

Bom stares her down with adoring admonishment. “You're just going to pester Ri or TOP again.”

Sandara giggles again, guiltily this time and Minji asks, “What are they like?”

Chaerin answers as a smiling man with bouncy hair curtaining his face glides across the floor towards them. (The throng parts before him, pushed gently away like dolphins do with the sea.)

“Just a bunch of rainbow porcupines. Don't spend to much time around anyone who isn't Taeyang. I swear, he's the only sane one here.”

“Say what?”

“CL!”

The smiling man pulls out from the throng, peace and calm radiating from his built form. Empath, Minji registers as her nerves abandon their frenzy and settle into a calm. This must be D-Lite.

Daesung leans over to Chaerin, who mirrors his smile with enough radiance, and they press kisses into each other's cheeks. Sandara leaves them to the pleasantries and pulls Minji down to the floor, heading for the tables tucked into a corner where people are roaring and throwing their money. Daesung inclines his head towards their backs.

“New member?”

“Yup. That's Minzy. We're here for a little party.”

“Initiated?”

“Just today. She's our new maknae.”

Daesung tips his head back to laugh, and it's infectious- the crowd behind him start dancing with more vigour and whoops begin chorusing.

“Want to set her up with Ri?”

Chaerin smacks him lightly. “She's six years younger!”

Bom moves away, heading for the drinks as something secretive simmers under Chaerin's tone and Daesung's smile makes a minuscule slip.

“So young?”

“The syndrome's getting more viscous nowadays.”

Daesung never lets the smile slip, but it becomes muted when he takes Chaerin's arm and leads her through the throng, a seamless glide, and towards the curtained stairs leading up to the booth above.

“GD's waiting for you.”

“He saw?” CL motions towards the man with a shock of neon hair, slipping Minji cards while Sandara excitedly adds her chatter to the gambling lesson.

“TOP saw you coming, yeah. But GD felt something last week.”

Chaerin stopped on the last step, and Daesung let go of her hand to sink back into the party.

“Bad feeling or good feeling?”

Daesung's smile broke into a wince.

“You'll see.”

* * *

 

Bom slides into a familiar seat and tosses a loose ice cube at the bartender's head.

“Did you lose a bet with GD?”

Youngbae turns, the mess of pink on his head swishing like loose ribbons. “Damn. Is it that obvious?”

Bom chuckles. “You all look like you lost a bet with GD. Well, except for D-Lite.”

Youngbae pours her usual for these kinda moods, something that'll fight down the maudlin her faux attitude can't. “That's because he was the guy who won the bet.”

Bom downs the shot with a chuckle and fingers the second glass, already set out. “Poor TOP.”

Youngbae nods. “Poor bingu.”

They pause for another drink, stare at each other for a total of two seconds and start laughing.

“Been a while since we called him that! I'll go pester him after this.”

“You go do that.”

Youngbae turns to slide something to another patron and poker chips start hailing them.

“I heard that! And I don't wanna hear that again you hear?” Bom turns to see Seunghyung shaking a fistful of chips at them, his other closed around his cards with Sandara making valiant efforts to pry it open.

“Okay bingu!” Youngbae and Bom chorus.

“Come here and play me right now! I dare you!”

Youngbae shakes his head as another ship goes sailing. “You go win for me Bom.”

Bom scrunches her nose at him. “For you?”

Youngbae thinks for a moment and corrects himself. “Go for my abs.”

Bom runs her eyes down to the open front of his vest, down exposed muscle, slick and toned. “Deal.”

* * *

 

Sandara slips away from the heating battle between Bom and Seunghyun, Minji caught between them with flush cheeks and determination in the vice grip around her cards. She slides into their booth, curtained with stripes and labeled ‘reserved’. She waits one minute before he slides in across her, women successfully evaded and a long drink in each hand.

“Dara!” Seungri grins, poking the slim concoction of vibrant blue and yellow globules at her.

“Victory! What happened to your hair!” Dara cheers and inquires with an exaggerated mix of shock and horror drawn into her face. Shs pulls her drink close, the crazy straw jiggling at her eyes.

Seungri grimaced and pulled at his pale locks. “Wasn't so victorious at last week's betting pool.”

Dara giggles and sips her drink as Seungri smiles at her.

“New member?”

“New maknae!”

“Ah damn!” Seungri makes an expression of mock anger, curling his hands into fist. “I can't tease CL noona anymore!”

Dara laughs and pats his arm reassuringly. “We'll find something Ri. CL shall not escape our grasp!”

* * *

 

Chaerin hooked her fingers around the handle of the door, ‘GD’ stencilled in glittering dark red across the night coloured metal.

She stepped in and entered a flurry of paper and fairy lights.

They were floating the papers about, Chaerin could see. They were little flecks of scattered light, harlequin scraps hanging by their edges. In the dip of the booth, someone had given the sofa a paper jacket. Chaerin flicked her eyes to the round table before the sofa and found ‘someone’ spread over it, hair aflame and suit artfully shredded.

“What did you do to your hair this time Dragon?”

Jiyong rolls, flame orange curls bouncing across his eyes. He stops half way, curling his lips into an angelic smile that pushes his cheeks into dimples. Across the bridge of his nose, the light bounces across glitter dust and turns his skin into a sky.

“CL! Your hair looks good too, no need to be jealous of mine.”

Chaerin self consciously pats her overhang of flat locks. “I had a bad dats with fire! And you don't look that amazing.”

Jiyong sat to pout at her and Chaerin ignored him, moving to the scribbles on the darkened glass wall on the other side of the booth. Dates, names, locations and prophecies were penned to it, vigorously seasoned by arrows and lines. Jiyong nodded it and frowned at her.

“I had something. Almost saw the whole song but- it's too big.”

“What?” Chaerin felt her heart stutter. “Too _big_?”

Jiyong jumped off the table and drew his finger around a rough sketch of Seoul.

“Something's happening. The syndrome's appearing too often, and it's going down the age list. Our lovely sunbaenims- they're getting put off.”

Charerin moved past him, to where the forest lay.

“The wolves town. There was a big wave there right?”

Jiyong nodded. “We're gonna be expecting some trouble. Not now, but in the future. We have some night children now though, the new group I told you about?”

“Bangtan? That's too few for several dozen wolves.”

“I agree. And they're too young. I've met them, the maknae is fucking fourteen. Now I love the kid, he's practically worshipping me, but that's too young for this bullshit.”

Chaerin backed away as Jiyong turned to the table and began hectically sweeping the papers. She's known him long enough to know his moods.

“I need you to check out something bad. Se7en sunbaenim came by for a while-”

Chaerin cut him off. “Is he coming back?”

Jiyong bit his lip and splayed his fingers across the table.

“He said maybe. He can see how bad this is getting. Anyway he came by to drop some pretty bad news. I need you to go south, maybe take Taeyang. Take the newbies for sure, they're lucky as hell.”

Jiyong wants her to take WINNER then. iKON's lucky too, just not the type of godly blessing WINNER has, and their strength lies in dealing with the youth citizens. Chaerin dreads asking him why she needs that kind of luck. “What is it?”

“Se7en said a curse blew up.”

“Fuck.”


	2. Stones

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One drunk night

“I would like,” Seunghyun declares over the table and his second bottle of wine. “Something normal on my headstone.”

Jiyong slurs at him, his head heavy on it's side, eyes glazed through the last few fizzes of his drink as his eyes strike Seunghyun through the glass. “I thought you wanted a Salvador Dali on your gravestone?”

Seunghyun nods and shakes his head. “That too. I mean like… cause of death?”

From the couch, Seungri mumbles something in his half sleep. “Hyung, predicting your death is bad luck…”

“Not like that. I just don't want ‘barbecued by a drunk dragon’ or ‘tripped and concussed himself on Taeyang's abs’ on my stone you know?”

Daesung snorts out his drink over the window he's looking out of. Jiyong thinks he hears Youngbae roaring in laughter and hitting his head on the doors of the cabinet's he's keeping the bottles in.

“You watch yourself Tabi. I'll barbecue you right now.”

Jiyong raises a shaky finger at him, already scaling over into a shiny red claw, and Seunghyun exaggerates his horror, falling out of his chair and stumbling towards Daesung.

“Dae, help! I'm gonna become the best damn Korean barbecue ever served!”

“Are you running away or praising yourself?”

Youngbae, like all good mother hens, pops his head out of clean up for a quick scold.

“No barbecuing people in the bar!”

“But Bae!” Jiyong whines and flops himself to the floor, rolling towards Youngbae's feet.

“Bae bae bae bae-”

Youngbae drops everything he's doing when Jiyong's hand suddenly clamps his ankle with a vice grip, the other scratching into the floor.

“Shit. Pen and paper!”

Jiyong's so lost in the vision- the song- he barely registers Seunghyun holding him down with his body while Seungri tears his already bloodied fingers away from the floor boards, a pen and paper shoved under it by Daesung.

Iron bars, he writes. Then he scratches it out and writes down ‘shutter’. He cuts that out too, scribbling ‘window’ over it.

“Let it out Ji.” Youngbae gently pries his fingers off his ankles and murmurs into his ear softly. “Let it out.”

Ji writes, and the images are as always too fast, a movie reel playing at 60 times the normal speed, and he barely catches anything important. Barely.

It takes him an hour, one stiff hour where Seunghyun tries to keep him from spasming, Daesung feeds him paper, Youngbae and Seungri taking turns to calm him down.

When the song's run itself through him, Jiyong flops forward and goes limp.

“You done? Okay Ji, lets get up.”

Seunghyun rolls off and Daesung pries the pen from Jiyong's death grip, leaving Youngbae to pick up the suddenly small form of their leader. As Youngbae steers himself to Jiyong's room, Daesung trails after them, pushing open doors and pushing away obstructions. Seungri hears Ji Yeon noona asking after them as a door opens.

“Ah, little dragon. Bad vision?”

“No, just a quick one, Gummy noona. He was a bit drunk.”

“Ah.”

The door closes and Seungri gets on his knees to fetch the papers Seunghyun hasn't managed to shuffle together.

“This isn't much.” Seungri says after a while, scrolling over chicken scratches and blots.

Seunghyun nods absentmindedly. “Must be something small. Seemed sharp though.”

Seungri hums something in agreement, and the night eats away at them.

(It will probably like this again next week.)

* * *

 

When morning comes Jiyong is up and he pretends, they pretend, that everything is fine and normal and they live in a world that does not hate them.


	3. Ghost Dreamers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Seunghyun drabble, mentions Tazza: The Hidden Card.

The woman stepped inside with confidence, her steps unfaltering and her head held high. Daesung does not notice her, moving past someone he will only remember for the faint scent of all too familiar nicotine, and instead guides a nervous titter of young men towards a booth.

She sits in the bar for ten seconds, moving away when Youngbae hands her a drink so generic, he'll never remember her for it. He'll remember her for the perfect, dark honey curls and red wood lipstick perhaps, but nothing more.

She moves past Seungri, one hand holding a bottle in place and the other stealing strawberries from a fruit bowl no is supposed to notice. (And yet they always do.) All he'll remember is silky black leather viewed through sleep deprived eyes and he'll move one to look at something that isn't swimming across his vision.

Jiyong will cast a glance out the dance floor, momentarily note a woman with a lifeless sleeve where her left hand should be, and go back to his song. (Zutter, he recalls. What's after zutter again?)

The woman stops at the gambler's table after someone ends a game screaming about money growing wings and flying away, and Seunghyun will find her most memorable. Not for they sweet suckle voice she had used when she asked if she could play, but for the sweet suckle voice she had used when she lost.

“Ah, oppa. I'll just give you these okay?”

Then she dropped the delicately wrapped set of cards into his open palm and walked away.

(No remembers her name, her face, her height, her age.)

* * *

 

Seunghyun's goal is to dream as often as he can.

Dreams are where he's gotten most of his memories. It's known fact by now that Seunghyun can't remember anything from before the night he ran into Jiyong and nearly bled out over the dragon. (What the fuck man? He had yelled.)

Seunghyun follows his dreams, the ones that make sense, as closely as he can. The night after he dreams of cards thrown into the snow, a ten pair staring up at him, he tries playing with Sandara. He'd swept her clean.

Seunghyun dreamed about painting once and he'd made something garishly blue-grey. It's still hanging over the bar last he checked, right where Youngbae put it.

(Seunghyun dreams about guns twice and never touches one because who dreams about solid metal warming their fingers, jerking and making the air go cold?)

Tonight Seunghyun sets the cards on his nightstand and goes to sleep.

* * *

 

Youngbae has dealt with Jiyong's eccentricities for a good decade by now, so the quirks of everyone else barely bother him. If Seunghyun walks up to him a few minutes shy of the bar's opening, removes the tall wines from their alcove and squeezes himself into the empty space, Youngbae isn't going to say anything.

“What's wrong hyung?” Seungri leans over the bar, looking down at where Seunghyun has folded his large form into the tiny space. He mumbles something incoherent and nuzzles into the sleeves of his jacket.

“Panda, don't bother him.” Jiyong reproaches from the other end, fingers digging into the food Youngbae set out. “Tabi needs to dream.”

“Oh.” Seungri pulls himself back, ambling away towards Daesung.

“He needs to dream?” Youngbae asks, wiping down the marble top of the bar.

“It's something important.” Jiyong says softly, swirling his food. “He's not gonna wake up a while.” He adds.

* * *

 

_“Let's name her Gwang Sool. It'll be funny if we name her Gwang Sool right?”_

_“You're naming a baby, not a dog!”_

* * *

 

When Dong-Wook flips up the bar's barrier and slides in a few minutes past closing time Youngbae raises an eyebrow.

“Seven-hyung?”

He leaned down and pressed his fingers under Seunghyun's closed eyes. They come away warm and wet, as Seunghyun shifts with a soft murmur.

“Dongsaeng was crying.” He explains softly. “Must be a bad dream.”

On the counter, Jiyong shakes his head. “It's a good dream. That's what makes it sad.”

Dong-Wook raises an eyebrow and Daesung emerges from somewhere with a blanket.

“All the good things he's lost and can never get back.”


	4. Doppelgänger

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sandara attempts to pull a prank on Jiyong. The situation gets out of hand.

When Jiyong sprints out of the throng and suddenly tackles Daesung with a giggle, he doesn't even blink. He merely reaches a hand to pat his back. “If you're that lonely in the booth, I'm sure Ri will be happy to to have you dote on him.”

Daesung blinks a little when a second Jiyong emerges, flushed and a mad glint in his eyes, but he just shrugs when the two chase each other out of his vision.

Lifting her head from a house made of coasters, Ji Yeon blinks at the disappearing twins.

“Was that GD and Dara?”

“Yep. Another drink Gummy noona?”

“Yes please.”

* * *

 

Jiyong crashes into Seungri next, a messy tangle of limbs held and broken apart by a giggling fit.

“Victory, hide me! I'm pranking!”

“Ah, Dara noona.”

He obliges, because that's what Sandara does when he runs past her with someones pants in his hands, screams coming from the bathroom. (Seunghyun hyung had let an ape loose in his rooms the next week. Moral of the story: do not prank a sleep deprived hyung.)

Seungri let's Sandara run her hand down an exposed strip of skin and, with great fascination that never runs out, watches her creamy, Jiyong-coloured skin thicken slightly. He watches her face as Jiyong's long fringe shorten into his neat cut, the dark hair darkening further, walnut eyes following suit. The last to go are the infamous baby dimples, then poof, Seungri's looking at himself.

“I'll buy you a drink later, thanks Riri!”

She kisses him on the cheek (how odd it must have seemed) and ran off just as Jiyong, the real Jiyong, pulls out from the crowd. He whips his head around wildly, a manic smile pulling his lips thin.

He collapses onto the couch beside Seungri and decides to ask him instead, the green extensions on his fringe turning neon under the lights.

“Dara's running around with my stuff. Seen her?”

“Depends. What stuff?” Seungri presses the cool rim of his glass to his lips.

“My phone. She's gonna prank text CL I think.”

“Nope, haven't seen her.”

Jiyong snatches his drink from his fingers. “You're dead Ri. So dead. I'm gonna sit on you later.”

Seungri waggled his eyebrows and reached for his drink. “But I haven't done anything oppa~”

Jiyong pulled his hand back and smacked over his crown. “Then how come I see another you sitting on Tabi's lap?”

Seungri whips around. 

“Hey, noona! Don't do weird things while you're wearing my face!”

* * *

 

Daesung gives Youngbae knowing-look-number-32 when a winded Seunghyun slides into the bar and Youngbae nods, passing Dara her usual.

“Is it too obvious?”

Youngbae shakes his head. “You've still got your lipstick on.”

“Wipe it off please.” Daesung sounds out. “Hyung looks horrifying with your lips.” He shudders and a quick look in the reflection of her glass assures Sandara that he's not lying.

Sandara puts forward a fish mouthed pout, her trademark expression looking misplaced on Seunghyun's angular face. Then her lips pale and thin into Seunghyung's, a perfect copy in every way.

“You know the other day my Maknae told me my ability was amazing.”

“Your maknae, the one who can punch through walls and lift cars with one hand?“

Sandara smacks Daesung between his dubiously furrowed eyebrows. Youngbae turns away from the guest he's attending to snicker.

“It sounds like a sarcastic compliment if you say it like that, but Minzy said it really sincerely.”

“She's young.” Youngbae shrugs. “Hasn't seen enough to reach the point where you'd just throw up your hands and tell the world to come at you.”

Daesung and Sandara nod, a little solemn.

“She saw your ability, has she seen the others yet?”

“She saw Bom blow stuff up. She hasn't seen CL though. That will be fun to watch.” Sandara giggles, an oddly high pitch on Seunghyun's voice.

“Crap. Shifts fading. Dae, lend me your face!”

Daesung looks at her warily through his bangs, extending his hand. “Solemnly swear not to shame me.”

“I solemnly swear I shall not shame you.” Sandara slaps his hand and grabs it firmly, shortening within seconds and filling out Seunghyun's chest into Daesung's.

“Thanks, gtg!”

“Did you just use text speak in a spoken conversation? Sacrilege!”

* * *

 

Jiyong slid into the seat beside Seunghyun and started searching his pockets.

“If you're looking for a condom Ji, they're in my back pocket.”

“Oh fuck you.”

Jiyong retracts his hands and Seunghyin drops a seven pair onto the table and sends two monks into chanting despair.

“Though you were Dara. She's running around with my phone.”

“A Dara in the middle of a prank is always better than a Dara planning a prank.”

“Not if you're the gut getting pranked!”

Seunghyun smirks and takes his newly dealt cards in his left. With his right, he raises the pinot noir to his lips.

“Your words GD, not mine.”

“Seriously Top, fuck you.”

“After twelve maybe.”

Jiyong steals the wine glass for that comment

* * *

 

Leaning halfway out of their booth, Bom motions to Minji. Curious, she draws close.

“You see the D Lite coming towards us and the D Lite handing around the bar?”

“What the- yeah I see them unnie.”

Bom hooks an arm around Minji and squashes their heads close.

“I'm gonna tell you how to tell which one is Dara. This top secret so you gotta listen close girl.”

Minji nods as best as she can. Bom whispers into her ear.

“Wait what? No- you can't be serious!”

“It's legit. Just look.”

Dara draws up to them and looks at Minji's unhinged jaw with confusion.

“Oh my god Bom did you tell her? I had a great prank in the works!”

Which is about a good a time as any for Jiyong to come sprinting out of nowhere and tackle Dara, her shape distorting heavily as she crashes into a table with a mad flail of arms.

“Phone!”

“What the fuck!”

Which is of course, also a good time as any for someone to start chanting.

“Fight! Fight! Fight!”

Bom stands up and waved madly to Youngbae.

“You pull GD and I'll pull Dara!”

Blatantly ignoring the mad rush to stamp down the beginnings of a mass frenzy, Seungri pours our Seunghyun's wine.

“You lent Dara your face too right?”

“Yup. I think Dae did too. He's coming over right now.”

Indeed, there was a figure of angelic presence walking towards them and against the crowd's flow towards what would qualify as a good night's entertainment.

“Give me my phone and the names of all the people who helped you!”

“Never!”

Daesung arrives and steals away Seunghyun's wine glass for a sip, a disgruntled groan and stink eye following. Daesung passes back the glass and he slides down to a chair beside Seunghyun, Seungri mirroring him.

“I bet Dara pulls GD's fringe and he loses.”

“I bet Dara pulls the fringe and GD goes berserk, thereby winning.”

“I bet Taeyang and Bom breaks it up before anything really interesting happens.”

The trio pause in consideration.

“50 won?”

“Okay.”


	5. Wings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Happy birthday, Kang Daesung!
> 
> Seungri begs a short flight from his favourite hyung. (Jiyong has been demoted for teasing him about the hair.) Daesung obliges.

Daesung leans back and tips his head to the night as Seungri leans into the railings on the roof to laugh into the air. It spirals below, a voice at war with the wind tails of traffic that never ceases. 

“Race me hyung!” Seungri says, his eyes lighting with white fire. 

There is something about this particular night, where everyone is safe under the same roof and danger has been dettered away, that makes the cold air taste like a home Daesung left behind years ago, nostalgic and bittersweet. He'd call the air fresh, if the tails of Seunghyung's smoke isn't making curls in the air. 

“You're going not live forever.” Daesung chides. (Again.)

Seunghyung grins around the cigarette and blows out more white puffs. “Or am I?” 

He's not, Daesung grumbles mentally. Maybe Jiyong will live forever, as the dragon he is, but Seunghyung will only live longer. Time pays no one favours, not even it's caretakers. 

Youngbae hits him good in the shoulder and Daesung turns away to chuckle, a soft sound accompanied by Jiyong and Seungri's giggling. High pitch, low pitch. 

“Hyung, really. Race me one round around Seoul.”

Daesung scrunches his nose at him and Seungri amends his statement. 

“To the river and back. Come on, you haven't exercised those in a while.”

Daesung is always one to entertain his dongsaeng but it's a dangerous request. Cloudy skies can always clear the next second, or plunge into roaring thunderstorms. They could be seen, then they could be killed. Peace is very delicate balance as of late. But Seungri is right. 

He hasn't felt the sky in a while. He misses it, the clouds that combed his through and left him damp, the rush of air that dried him the next. Daesung's memories of the exact taste of thin air, the sight of a dazzling city sprawled under him, is starting to become hazy. 

“One round,” Daeung concedes. “To the river and back.”

Seungri's illuminated grin is contagious and worth it, Daesung supposes. His grin and the grins from the others he sees in his peripheral vision match. 

“Don't expect to win maknae.” He scolds playfully. 

Seungri, still a fresh young adult, sticks his tongue out and Daesung pokes at him, laughing while two appendages furl out into existence on his back. Once his total wingspan is spread and in danger of smacking Jiyong in the face (Youngbae is quick to pull him away) Seungri bursts into flames. 

White flames, muted by the grace of their home's illusion, but stunning all the same. The short pillar of luminous white collapses inwards before fanning outwards into a phoenix. 

“Race you in three!” The voice bellows into their heads. 

Daesung steadies himself and yells for Seunghyung. “Count for us so he doesn't cheat!” 

Seunghyung puts the cigarette away and obliges with amusement. He lifts three fingers. 

“Three!”

Daesung flaps his wings experimentally. Nothing wrong there.

“Two!”

Seungri practically starts vibrating in place. 

“One!”

It is a pure miracle that they don't shatter the roof with their take off, the force having blown the land bound trio into the railing and the two fliers up into the air in spirals of white. From down below, they hear faint laughs. 

Jiyong squints upwards at the angel and phoenix circling each other and remarks, “Beautiful.”

Behind him, Youngbae and Seunghyung agree.


	6. Friday, the thirteenth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Happy Friday the thirteenth!  
> This chapter: The three big bosses arrange an inter-department bonding session. Jiyong gets to eat a lot of names.

“Everyone, everyone, everyone.” Yang Hyun-Suk began with a shot titled in his hands. “Does anyone know why today is unlucky?”

The candles that lit the room set the mood well, casting the table and it's guests in eerie half shadows. It was a good prop for the mood, if it weren't for one fact.

“It's Friday the thirteenth…” Lee Soo-Man grumbled and sniffed at the air. “Are these scented candles?”

“We're out of normal candles.” Park Jin-Young informed him.

“The mood is right… but it smells like apple cinnamon- and why is there lemon grass?” Soo-Man grimaced. “This is a really bad combination.”

“Why are we here?” Jiyong whispered to Kim Junmyeon. The wolf paused, before admitting with a shrug. “I don't know. Annual meeting?”

“Can't they do it without us?” Wang Feifei grumbled.

Jin-Young nudged her. “Don't be rude.”

“We will not involve them though.” Soo-Man huffed. “Let's get to the real office and get this over with.”

“Pushy.” Hyun-Suk sighed. “You lot get along now.” He said, motioning to the group.

Then the trio left, exiting into a separate room.

Chaerin looked up from her nails, finger still rubbing against an odd edge and asked in wonderment, “Did they just lock the door?”

“Ah!” Taeyeon said suddenly. The table of thirteen jumped. “I know what this is!”

“It's the ‘Night of Thirteen’ game.” Jinki bemoaned, and everyone else groaned.

* * *

 

To humans, a variant of this game is known as ‘Musical Chairs Alone’. But that game only invites one guest, and it is played by humans. It may also be played at any night.

Night of Thirteen invites twelve to a table of thirteen, and is never played by creatures as mortal as a human. Lastly, this game can only by played on Friday the thirteenth.

“So we must find the ‘ghost’?” Chaerin mused. “We have to name off first then.”

The objective of this game is to locate a thirteenth person, a ghost who should not be there. One typically begins by discerning just who is there.

“Your dragon can start.” Wang Fei Fei bit out.

Jiyong giggled at her. It was good for him that her part of the organisation, a mess of politics and media control, knew to be wary.

“GD.” He supplied. Chaerin raised an eyebrow at the usage of his alias here, amongst their ‘colleagues’ bit followed his lead anyway. “CL.”

Kim Hanbin picked up after her, stuttering under the oppressive atmosphere that came with being surrounded by seniors. “BI.”

Kang Seungyoon smiled brightly, oblivious as he had every luxury to be, and raised several eyebrows as he introduced himself as Seungyoon. Jiyong and Chaerin bared their teeth playfully, in mocking pride as people tried to use the given name to peer at him and flinched as they were rebuffed by the fairy's natural shields.

“Your side, Wang.” Chaerin taunted. The woman bristled but obliged. “Fei.”

“JB.” Im Jaebum said with a nervous smile to match Hanbin. Park Jisoo intruduced herself as Jihyo. Kim Yubin barely bothered to look up from her phone and gave them her full name. There were whispers then, and when Chaerin nudged a squinting Jiyong he murmured worryingly into her ear.

“I see it,” he said. “She's powerful.”

Everyone turned and waited for the domestic sector to introduce themselves.

“Tae.” Kim Taeyon said. A half-name, Jiyong tasted.

“Suho.” Kim Junmyeon followed, and Jiyong rolled around the plastic name with his tongue, a complete fake. It was the same as the name Lee Jinki gave, Onew.

Song Qian rounded off the chain with ‘Victoria’, which tasted half-true to Jiyong. Or she should have rounded it off, but another name was said right after hers.

“There's the ghost.” Yubin pointed out to a confused Jaebum. “But I can't remember what it said.” He puzzled.

“That's why it's the ghost.” Taeyeon explained kindly. “It's there but it's presence isn't on the same plane yet. We only feel impressions.”

“Then how do we find it?” Seungyoon asked.

“We talk to it.” Junmyeon supplied. “Ask it questions.”

Jiyong lolled his tongue out and tested the air. “Is it Kim?”

There was a soft sound that was forgotten after it was made, but it left a distinct sense of disagreement.

Jinki tried next. “Lee?”

Another sound of disapproval. Seungyoon leaned into Hanbin excitedly. “It's like playing hangman. Is it Park?”

Seungyoon's smile did not waver despite it being wrong, and he whipped his head around happily waiting for someone else to try.

With Fei's encouragement, Jisoo asked hesitantly. “Im?”

“Im!” The ghost voiced, more clear now as the ritual brought the two planes closer. “Im -.”

“Three part name.” Fei observed with a sigh. “Im Seung?”

“No.”

Junmyeon asked, in quiet politeness, if it was Im Jong.

“Im Jong-!” The ghost trilled. The candles had begun snuffing out by now, and a wind without origin was caressing their hairs into frenzied whips.

“Im Jong Young?” Taeyeon said, raising her voice.

“No!”

“We're getting this quite quickly.” Yubin noted happily. “Im Jong Soo?”

“No!”

Something sharp spiked Jiyong's tongue. He retracted it with a pout but made his suggestion cheerily. “Im Jong Hyun!”

“No!”

The winds got harder, as they should when the guests grew father from the desired answer. To say a ghost's name is to call it's presence to you- to call a ghost incompletely is to be rude.

Seungyoon tried again, yelling over the cacophony. “Im Jong Ki!”

“Im Jong Ki!” The ghost bellowed, and it was seen then why mortals do not play this game. The sound alone was shattering, snuffing candles and leaving them to the light of Jiyong's dragon fire flickering under his skin, Taeyeon's ethereal shine, Yubin's burst of yellow light and the low hum of Seunghoon's fairy light. The force of the two planes colliding, limbo's vastness shaking down the contained room, brought the younger creatures to their knees.

There was a moment of suspension, as the collision reached its climax and the force could grow no greater, remaining heavy in the air in mock confusion. Then the cacophony resumed in rapid chaos, as the limbo, and the ghost, pulled back sharply into their rightful places.

“Why are the inter-department bonding sessions so convulted?” Fei grumbled.

“It's either this or death matches.” Jinki reminded her.


	7. Helios

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A mystery is found and solved.  
> (Happy birthday, Taeyang!)

If Jiyong was asked who the most powerful of their group is, he would say himself. Then he would laugh, say it was a joke, and say it was Youngbae really. Seungri is too young, he would argue, and Daesung is too kind. Seunghyung, he would add, doesn't know shit.

“But Taeyang knows what he's doing.” Jiyong says. “And you just don't fuck with the sun.”

* * *

 

Relay this to Youngbae when you see him.

“He called me the sun?” Youngbae would ask. “He should know better.”

You should ask him what that meant.

“He should know better,” Youngbae repeats. “But you shouldn't know anything so let's keep it that way.”

* * *

 

You ask Seunghyung next.

“Well, he only fights when the sun is out. That's the only reason we call him Taeyang.” Seunghyung would shrug, and you would trip over questions as you chased him, an ever-fleeting spectre.

* * *

 

You give up on chasing Seunghyun, as you should. You can't catch him anyway. At this point you should ask Daesung.

“I don't know!” He answers cheerily to every question, evading you and keeping the secrets you so desperately crave. But Daesung is, above all else, loyal and you know that he'll never divulge anything of meaning to you.

* * *

 

Seungri is the most loose lipped, and maybe that's why he's the hardest to find. He knows his limits, and he has been their friend long enough to tell where the boundaries lie.

You search for him, seeing tails of the white phoenix, but you never manage to close your hands around the hem of his jacket.

Your hands do, however, close around a strip of paper in the wind, an unmistakable scrawl on it.

_Try watching him._

* * *

 

You give up on asking, and watch how Youngbae acts over the week as per Seungri's suggestion. You watch like a hungry hawk, nestled into a private booth you hope his eyes can't spot you in.

In the daylight, he is muted. Which is unusual, but it is true. His movements are closer to how a normal human's should be, with slow movements and sluggish drags in between the everyday combination of muscular movement. But his movements are freer under the sunlight, unrestricted. He gives more hugs, his arm is sling around Seungri and Seunghyung more often and skin contact rises in frequency.

In the night, Youngbae does not look human. Every movement pops and lifting his hand for a simple wave somehow looks mechanically sharp. He avoids touching most people now, but Jiyong remains an avid receiver of occasional hugs. Jiyong, Chaerin and others, all whom you notice are the sturdier souls, capable of brushing off getting hit by cars. (You've seen that once.) Youngbae handles his appliances, his array of bar top tools and alcohol bottles with an air of delicacy, like half-inch thick glass could shatter at any given moment under feather-like touches. It's like he's fighting, you think, fighting to keep divine strength trapped in mortal skin.

You think you have the puzzle. And you also know what you should be getting Youngbae for his birthday.

* * *

 

Youngbae leans back into a freshly cleaned bar, sighing and rubbing a hand into a creased vest. He pauses as a hand settles itself over his eyes, small and light.

“Happy birthday. Now close your eyes if you want your present.” Hyorin says.

“No birthday kiss?” Youngbae jokes as he lets his eyes slide shut. “I'm disappointed.”

Hyorin's voice sounds out as an airy laugh as Youngbae feels her hand settle around his neck. “You'll get more than a kiss tonight. Now open your eyes.”

Youngbae slowly blinks in the hazy mix of fog filtered dawnlight and the muted frenzy of disco lights in the empty bar. He looks down, running his hands over the chain around his neck and settling at a round pendant. Youngbae titls it to the light and smiles when he spots the faint enragement of a crescent moon.

“You figured it out.” Youngbae grins, turning to face Hyorin. She pecks him on the lips with a smile.

“No thanks to you and your secret-upholding team!”


	8. 160818

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> During their anniversary holiday, Jiyong duplicates.

During their annual break, Jiyong duplicates.

They have never missed the annual break, although at times the annual break may be as long as a month or as short as hours. This year the annual break was a week long, which is enough to stretch some wings and have the kind of inappropriate sex that was hard to pull off at home. (The new kids were everywhere- Seunghyun says he found Lisa and Rose in his closet once.)

They'd pulled the Russia card, and while this was more ‘tundra’ than ‘the brilliant streets of Moscow’, Seungri found that it wasn't too cold, _and yes, he could handle it so for the love of god Daesung stop putting scarves over his sweaters!_

Seungri had been enjoying lying around the hearth of their resort cottage, while Youngbae sought to fill the mini fridge with something they could eat that was not made up in any way whatsoever of Vodka. Seunghyung and Daesung, if Seungri was to guess, were ‘frolicking’ about in the snow.

It had been fine, until Seungri decided to risk it and search the dining area for something with low alcohol content. Seungri walked into the kitchen/dining are and got a good eyeful of two identical Jiyong's sitting across each other on the dining table.

“Oh come on Ji. We're on break.” Seungri whined, and he stormed out to call Youngbae and complain about _Jiyong doing thing again, you know where he calls trouble to come to it? Do something hyung there are two of them in the kitchen and we're supposed to be on break-_

Youngbae comes back early, with less food then he would have liked, and sighs when he sees Seungri simmering on the balcony, melting snow off the roof and burning the barbecue charcoal with white fire.

Youngbae walks into the kitchen, sets the bags down and very determinedly addresses the two Jiyongs.

“Get an appointment. We are on break, and we will remain on our hard earned break unless the apocalypse breaks down the door.”

“We don't know which is the real one.” Jiyong one and Jiyong two chorus, and Youngbae feels his headache returning.

His headache does return of course, when Seunghyun and Daesung come back with bits of clothes missing, hands held, an axe and a shotgun in each free hand, complaining about cockblocking doppelgängers.

“I'm sure Chaerin didn't book us at a resort with a pea-pod alien infestation on purpose.” One of the Jiyong's say.

“I'm not sure.” Daesung points out. “You did turn her favourite leopard purple.”

“Stupid Jiyong.” Seungri murmurs from the balcony, and he groans when he looks down to see three Seungri's waving cheerily at him from the edge of the forest outside their cottage.

**Author's Note:**

> [Ask Me Anything!](http://ask.fm/AlexElyssian)


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